Frequently Asked Questions

Infinity College Bookstore buys textbooks directly from students. Usually, after final exams, you won’t need a textbook any more. By selling your books, you get cash for books you no longer need.

We buy textbooks all year round. We have always thought it’s better to buy all the time, rather than doing like some bookstores who only buy around finals. Here are our store hours and a map. If we’re open, we’re buying!

It often works this way at other stores. But at Infinity, most of the time you don’t get a higher price at finals. In fact, you might get less. It usually pays to sell books as soon as you don’t need them anymore.

Sometimes. Usually these books still have value despite not having this stuff. However, the price we offer may be less. Our ability to buy books without CD’s, codes, and accessories sets us apart from competitors. Often they won’t buy the book at all if it’s missing components.

Yes. Writing, highlighting, and marks are not usually a problem.

Yes, if they have small amounts of writing and markings and can be used again. In fact, we’re glad to get these because good condition used ones are hard to find.

We cannot buy them if they are missing pages or have lots of writing or marks.

We buy damaged books on a case-by-case basis. Some we can still buy, though at a reduced price due to condition. Others are just in too bad of shape to be sold and used again.

Excessive writing and markings are usually OK, but the price we offer will be much lower than for the same book in good condition. Sometimes, there are books with extreme amounts of marks and mess than we simply can’t buy.

We like to buy customized editions for UAH, when possible. We’re often the only store that will buy UAH custom books back.

We do not usually buy customized editions for any school other than UAH.

We do not buy the following:

• International editions


• Instructor’s editions (Note: If your book has black tape on the cover anywhere, it’s probably an instructor’s edition)


• Free copies, professional copies, complementary copies, review copies (these are sample books given to instructors by the publishers)


• Counterfeit or pirated copies of books

The one exception is if you bought the book from our store. Then we’ll try to buy it back if it’s still a current edition. This won’t apply to pirated stuff, because we don’t sell that kind of thing.

No, we don’t require any ID.

You’ll need to gather all your books together that you no longer need. Also, please bring any CD’s, unused access codes, and any other accessories that go with the books. We often need these items to include with the book when we sell it. In addition, sometimes having these items will get you extra money.

The next step is to bring all the books inside the store, to the counter. We’ll check them out, see what their value is, and make you an offer.

If the book still has value elsewhere, we’ll buy it. Students from other schools will be using it.

This depends on a bunch of factors: whether the book is a current edition, how easy or difficult it is for us to sell, whether it’s going to be used again by local colleges, how much other book companies will pay us for it, how many copies we have already, and so on.

For UAH textbooks, we usually pay around half of our own used textbook price. There are a wide range of prices paid, usually anywhere between $15 and $80. We have occasionally paid up to $110 for a single book, but that is pretty rare.

For other schools, we’re often paying between $5 and $60. A large percentage of these fall between $20 and $40.

Cash, baby, cash! We pay in cash because it’s easiest for you.

If you are not in Huntsville or cannot make it by the store for some reason, you can arrange to mail books to us (call 256-513-9181 to arrange this) and we’ll mail you a check for them. We can buy books from anywhere in the United States.

In addition, we offer you a 10% buyback bonus if you take store credit. For instance, if you sell us $100 worth of books and opt for store credit, we’ll credit your account with $110. You’ll then have a full year to spend this credit at Infinity. Store credit is a great option if you’re going to be buying books in the future. (Note: Store credit expires a year from the date it’s issued, so you’ll need to spend it within a year)

Sometimes, but there is one major mistake lots of people make: They keep the books, but they don’t actually use them in many cases. Realizing this, they’ll come to sell these books many years after their classes ended. By that time, a new edition of the books has been published, and the books from their college days are outdated and not worth any money.

There’s no sense in missing out on hundreds of dollars in buybacks, or having books clutter your house for years and then get nothing. We don’t want that to happen to you! Our advice is that you be absolutely sure you’ll use a book in the future before you decide to keep it. Otherwise, it needs to be sold ASAP before the publishers get a chance to produce a new edition.

You can often find a cheap copy of the book you used in class after a couple years pass. That edition goes old, and people are willing to part with it very cheap. The idea is for you to sell when the book is current and worth perhaps $50, then buy it for $10 or less later on. This way, you pocket $40 and will have a copy for the future if you need it.

Yes. Codes often have some value. If you have an unused code, please bring it in.

Yes, but they’re usually not worth very much. You might get $1 to $10 per book. We sometimes buy an occasional high school book or home school textbook.

Yes, but please call us first to arrange this. The number is (256) 513-9181. We can buy books from anywhere in the United States.

Multiple copies are fine. We’ll buy as many as we think we can sell.

We can’t buy them, but you can keep them, discard them, or give them away.

Yes. We have folks bring up to 200 books at once sometimes. But it may not be best to bring them all. Most books that were published before 1990 are not worth any money, so there’s no reason to bring them. It’s better to just bring the ones from 1990 to the present.

If you have more than 200 books to bring, please give us a call at (256) 513-9181 and let us know you’re coming so we can prepare. It takes a while to look all these up.

Yes, pretty often. We don’t promise to beat everybody every time, but here are two real-life examples of transactions where we whipped the competition:

• A UAH student came in with a couple books. We offered her $35 for each. She was actually a bit disappointed with our offer and decided to go the UAH on-campus bookstore to compare prices. In a half hour, she was back. They had offered her $10 for one book, and wouldn’t buy the other. We gave her $70.


• A competitor had offered a student a measly $6 for four or five books. They had also charged her a ridiculous fee when she returned a rental book in damaged condition. We bought her books for $106 and gave her a free T-shirt. She was sure happy to find us!

It’s fine to compare buyback prices, but it will take you some time and effort to go to multiple stores. If you do get a higher offer at another store, please let us know and we’ll see if we can beat it.

There are a couple things to watch out for when you go to sell textbooks. To start with, you’ll want to be sure that you won’t need the book again in a future class. You don’t want to sell the book back, then have to turn around and buy it again at a higher price

On occasional titles, it may be a good idea to keep a book rather than sell it. For instance, a nursing student might keep a drug guide that she’ll use at the hospital later on. Also, some books just don’t have much value at buyback, and if you’re only getting a few bucks for a book, it might be better to just hang on to it.